Worker sues after rape investigation

BELLEFONTE (AP) — A central Pennsylvania state prison employee who told her superiors she didn’t feel safe doing her job alleges she was punished for voicing her complaints.

The Centre Daily Times reported Tuesday the lawsuit brought by counselor Melissa Reed alleges that supervisors at the State Correctional Institution at Rockview in Centre County never acted on complaints that she first raised in October 2011 until August 2013.

That’s when investigators came to examine safety protocols after police said an inmate raped a clerical employee in July.

Reed says she was punished by being transferred to a lower-level job that required her to work in isolated groups with inmates and had fewer safety protocols than the counselor job.

A Corrections Department attorney says Reed has offered no evidence of wrongdoing.